"Writing is a skill, not a talent, and thus one's ability as a writer can be improved by thoughtful effort. The problem with some people is that they graduate college as good writers, experience early success on account of that, and thus never devote themselves diligently to the relentless quest for improvement that could make them great writers."

The trend I saw was interesting…as a beginner blogger, I linked there quite a bit. His reports on Islamic cruelty to women were compelling. He had strong opinions on the American ostrich politics regarding the tsunami of Islamic danger heading America’s way. Over the months I linked less; either I felt more comfortable with my own voice or his had changed it’s tune. Then he started attacking other bloggers. You know the rest of the story.

One may attack other bloggers -- and I love a good Rule 4 flame-war perhaps a bit too much -- without behaving in a Johnsonesque manner that would disgrace a third-grade schoolgirl. If you don't know the rest of the story, you can just click here and keep scrolling. But it is the underlying cause of what "semi-literate bigot" Jim Hoft has called the "Little Green Meltdown," and not its detailed history, that must be addressed now.

Rather than continuing to do useful and original work on his blog, Charles at some point decided that LGF would be about the commenters, with him playing queen-bee to a hive of pseudonymous Lizards in more-or-less continuous Open Thread mode.

This is how Charles Johnson became proprietor of a libel factory, and this is why Little Green Footballs is now "Left Channels." Maybe Allahpundit should go ahead and add Media Matters and Crooks & Liars to that category, just to make clear what type of evil business Mad King Charles is transacting. His stock in trade nowadays is to attribute mala fides to conservatives.

Between Wrong and EvilTo say that Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) shouldn't have shouted "You lie!" during President Obama's address to Congress is merely to say what Wilson himself has admitted -- it was rude and unnecessary, an error of judgment. A congressman ought not shout such things at the president, even when he's lying through his teeth in a televised primetime speech. (Bill Clinton was arguably the most shameless liar in American political history; he was, as Democratic Sen. Bob Kerrey of Nebraska said, an unusually good liar.)

Errors of judgment and lapses of decorum are one thing. To fart in a crowded elevator is wrong, but does not necessarily make the perpetrator evil.

However, to say that Wilson's outburst was motivated by racial animosity is to assert mala fides. To then cite as supporting evidence of Wilson's bad faith his membership in the Sons of Confederate Veterans is to say that every member of the SCV shares the same ill motives and to inaugurate a fruitlessly divisive discussion that can have no end this side of "Damn Yankee scoundrel! Pistols at dawn, suh!"

These sorts of affairs are all fine and good for the pseudonymous likes of "Dave of Sweden," you see, who can pop up, post some garbage about the Swedish anti-jihad movement being controlled by "racists" and then disappear into the online slime-pit from which he emerged.

Like Joe Wilson, however, Pamela Geller is a real human being and not a mere Internet alias. What Charles Johnson did, by promoting "Dave of Sweden" and repeating other people's attacks on Vlaams Belang as "ultra-nationalist," was to question Pamela's motives, disparage her character and defame her good name. Pamela was confronted with a choice:

Shall I deny being a vicious hater? Shall I denounce Richard Spencer and Peter Brimelow? How many others will Charles Johnson require me to denounce before he's satisified? And how well did the deny-denounce-and-apologize approach to such accusations work out for George Allen?

Having watched this liberal game being played for so long, I have learned one thing: When a white guy points the finger at another white guy and screams, "Raaaaacist!" don't just examine the accusation, examine the accuser.

CJ the Third-Grade Queen BeeOf course, it may be simultaneously true that (a) Charles Johnson is a gutless sissy, and (b) I am the spiritual heir of Theodore Bilbo. However, if the gutless sissy's accusation seems fishy, if my general political orientation is self-evidently not Bilboesque, then the more important subject of inquiry is not my allegedly evil agenda, but rather the agenda of my accuser.

Charles Johnson could not accept the possibility that he was wrong and Geller was right. To side with Geller against "Dave of Sweden" would be to confess that he, Charles Johnson, was ignorant of something about which Geller was knowledgeable. Johnson's intellectual bullying resembles malignant narcissism, the characteristic trait of the totalitarian.

CJ's attitude toward Geller manifested an unscrupulous desire to be recognized as some sort of Official Arbiter, rather than being content merely to participate as an equal in the public discourse. It is this narrow, selfish ambition -- the "Mean Girls" quest to be acknowledged as the Queen Bee of the third-grade playground, deciding who is worthy of membership in the Pretty And Popular clique -- that has led Charles Johnson down the road to self-destruction. It's not about politics or ideology or racism, it's about Charles.

Little Green Footballs, along with its blog owner, Charles Johnson, has jumped the shark and has transformed itself into a lower-grade version of the Kos Kiddie Day Care Center, the PuffHo or the DUmmyland. Attacks on conservative talk show hosts and bloggers, smears against Christians and inexplicable defense of the likes of Van Jones, the 9/11 Troofer moonbat green jobs czar.

When Little Green Footballs, a blog founded by Charles Johnson, started to go off the conservative rails over the past year, many dismissed Johnson’s erratic, obsessive rantings as classic signs of blogger burnout, or a perilously tight ponytail. Indeed, as Johnson lashed out at other conservative websites . . . bloggers across the political spectrum cringed at the precipitous descent of a once-proud stronghold of conservatism.

After complaining constantly about leftist infiltrators coming to LGF to "slur" the site with derogatory comments, what do you suppose Charles Johnson's reaction to one of his own commenters (who happens to be an LGF administrator) doing the exact same thing to another blog?

Lessons? CJ has lost it, destroying a perfectly good blog that I used to enjoy reading. Also, stay on that Other McCain's good side, or you could wind up like Mr. Johnson.

Grateful as I am for the intended compliment, this is not about enhancing a reputation for stomping arrogant bullies into blogospheric smithereens. (See Why It's Not a "Blog War.") Polemical skill aside, there is indeed an educational purpose, and the real lesson is about what actually caused the Madness of King Charles.

What Sowell explains (here I distill a complex argument to its essence, in my own words) is that liberals are latter-day Pharisees, their worldview deformed by a desire to think of themselves are morally and intellectual superior, and to be recognized as such by others. This is the flattering temptation to which Charles Johnson has so spectacularly succumbed.

I've learned recently that neo-fascists are much more prominent in conservative circles than I had previously realized. There are other well-known pundits who are sympathetic to the fascists, too -- I've drastically revised my opinion of more than a few people, e.g. Diane West, Richard Miniter, and several others. . . .I'm now getting hate mail from Andrew Bostom, who believes we should all be joining forces with European white nationalists, calling me all kinds of names and insults.It's an eye-opener about Bostom.

No, Charles, it was an "eye-opener" about you. To accept your fear-mongering would require us to believe that, inter alia, Orianna Falacci, Pim Fortuyn, Phyllis Chesler, Mark Steyn and Brigitte Bardot have been guilty of "joining forces with European white nationalists." As I've said before, when Vlaams Belang starts flying jetliners into skyscrapers, then I'll start worrying about the Flemish Menace.

At some point, Charles, your cut-and-paste Ransom Note Method attacks on conservatives and your Six Degrees Of Guilt-By-Association games have the cumulative impact of preventing effective cooperation for the defense of Western civilization against its two most powerful and active enemies, violent Islamist extremism and the Left. (The "Unholy Alliance," as David Horowitz has called it.)

And all because you, Charles Foster Johnson, couldn't admit that Pamela Geller knew more about the European anti-jihad movement than your commenter "Dave of Sweden." So you've backstabbed all your former friends. Now Rusty Shackleford and Ace of Spades are laughing their asses off at your expense, and you find yourself utterly and embarrassingly alone, the disgraced laughingstock of the blogosphere. Maybe you should ask "Dave of Sweden" for some help, Charles.

UPDATE: Trying to avoid the Lizard King's obsessed-with-commenters attitude, I'll take up a couple of points raised below. Estragon comments:

His anti-Christian rhetoric had escalated well before any of these recent incidents, as had his tendency to choose enemies on the right and ban posters who failed to toe the company line 100%. This has been building for a couple of years, at least.

OK, a "couple of years" -- as I said, Charles went after Geller in October 2007, but if you mean a couple of years before that, I'd be interested in seeing examples of CJ's anti-Christian attitude circa 2005-06.

One thing I've discussed before, which I've noticed ever since becoming an ex-Democrat circa 1994-96, is the GOP elite's tendency to blame their conservative grassroots, most especially the Religious Right, for every defeat. This was true after Bob Dole (who was never a limited-government conservative or a darling of the Religious Right) lost the 1996 presidential election, a defeat that Christopher Caldwell perversely blamed on rednecks and which prompted David Brooks' idiotic "National Greatness."

And, though I swear I'm not succumbing to Chronic Degenerative Lizardmania, Estragon also uses "libertarian" to describe Johnson's ideology. This is an abuse of the term "libertarian" that I've usually heard from Republicans (surely the commenter "Estragon" cannot be the former TPM blogger?) who use it to mean "soft" on abortion, gay rights, etc.

However, I'm pro-life and oppose the cultural Marxists who call themselves the "gay rights movement," yet I have a strong libertarian tendency vis-a-vis free markets and limited government. I am an Austrian in economics -- i.e., a devotee of Mises and Hayek -- and a Madisonian (e.g., Federalist #10) in politics.

Describing LGF as "libertarian" would get you a furious argument from most Austrians, including the Rothbard/Rockwell types associated with the Mises Institute, who opposed the Bush war policy that Charles Johnson supported, as well as from many Madisonians who share Ron Paul's staunch opposition to Big Government. (Lots of Paulistas in the Tea Party movement.) And, hey, Don't Blame Me, I Voted For Bob Barr!

It is possible to analyze Johnson’s bizarre attacks from a political viewpoint. He was apparently a "9/11 liberal": Someone with no previous involvement in conservative politics who was alarmed by the radical Left's treacherous attempt to undermine America's military response to Islamist terrorism. Nothing wrong with such patriotic sentiment in time of war -- it would be nice if more liberals felt that way -- but it is not to be confused with conservatism.After Republicans blundered away their congressional majority and the war in Iraq became increasingly unpopular, Johnson's liberal views on domestic politics -- and perhaps even more than that, his intense animosity toward traditional Judeo-Christian belief -- evidently drew him back toward the Democratic Party. Thus, in recent months, he has repeatedly lashed out against Glenn Beck and the “Tea Party” movement.

We also get some much-appreciated linky-love from Adrienne's Catholic Corner who informs us (without linking LGF) that Mad King Charles is on a new crusade. Now he's attacking "the Christian far right -- the extreme fundamentalists behind much of the home-schooling movement -- and their almost total withdrawal from American culture," for which he cites as his authority fellow Obama idolator Frank Schaeffer.

Secondly, if you want to see what "total withdrawal from American culture" looks like, go watch some of the PJTV interviews with Charles Johnson that Smitty linked earlier. If sitting around feeding your 24/7 paranoiac obsession with blog commenters is "American culture," then I guess my confident, outgoing children -- all hail the mighty Brick Squad! -- are freaks. (Of CJ's recent madness, one Christian blogger recently e-mailed to tell to me, "It's demon possession, straight up." Don't know if that was before or after seeing those videos of pale, nervous, shifty-eyed Charles.)

As I've said before, Charles Johnson seems to live a hermit's existence. He is rumored to be so introverted as to be anti-social, even misanthropic. If Mad King Charles hates populism -- and is he fixated on that 9/12 rally, or what? -- maybe it's because he hates people.

What all three studies suggest, then, is technological innovations or disease prevention will likely result in slight savings or even increased costs (though obesity may be the exception to this trend). This doesn't mean, of course, that we shouldn't keep inventing drugs and devices to keep people alive longer, or that we shouldn't develop better prevention strategies. It just means that we should stop pretending that good health is always cheaper. Sometimes, you really do get what you pay for.

I think that there is a larger causality problem that goes unmentioned. When you pay copious bucks over decades for health care, you burden the government with the expectation that they will fix whatever ails you. Of course that's unreasonable, and of course people will have those expectations. The only means of holding people accountable is not making the government accountable.

But forget all that. Time for a little Baroque and Roll featuring BOC:

The two heads kick around the idea of whether the Tea Party morphs into a third party, or eats the GOP for breakfast. It's the most cogent discussion on the topic I've seen yet.

It's fascinating to consider the similarity between the GOP and the POTUS. Together, they are in a situation where their personal power fetish is their own worst enemy. Each has to decide whether they will give up some of what they consider rightfully theirs in order to maintain greater fidelity with their public image.

In the case of the former, I think there may be some hope. The jig is up for centralization. Whether you want to label it "Compassionate" or "National Greatness" or "NeoCon" Conservativism, it still spells staggering deficits and unsustainable debt.

In the latter case, Don Surber seems to recommend a rubber ducky, as the inflatable life preservers are colloquially known among squids. (Hat tip: Fishersville Mike). It seems that BHO genuinely believes in the course he's steering. That's not the kind of belief which can be readily amended, if Jimmy Carter is any evidence.

Of the two, the GOP is more likely to survive a come-to-Beavis moment.

USS Valley Forge (CG 50), made a port call in Santa Barbara. This was about 10 years ago. She's a submarine now.

The Palace Grill is an excellent place, wallowing in ambiance. In the old naval tradition, the Damage Control Assistant and I were in service dress blues. The DCA was rather an introvert, and part of my task was to show the guy how to have a decent time on the town. The waiter came around and passed out a sheet with the lyrics to some other song, whose title is lost to fuzzy memory, and the whole place sang it.

By the time I was on my second cajun martini (straight gin with a red pepper) I decided we needed to reprise the fun of the first song. No no no, said the waiter, we don't do that more than once per evening. I insist, I replied, and offered to stand on my chair and lead the singing. Uncertain as to how drunk I was, yet persuaded by the uniform, he acquiesced. So I wound up standing on a chair in Santa Barabara in SDBs belting out "That's Amore".

Getting down off the chair and seating myself, I told the DCA: "And that's how you do it". Go, Navy.

When you're compiling a post the size of an FMJRA, you not only make technical boo-boos (as tweaked in the comments) but you can omit some good friends. Technorati isn't perfect, even when in use. Where was Paco? Was there enough Little Miss Attila? Whither Cynthia Yockey?

The embarrassment gets even worse when, in addition to great posts, they've also emailed the links directly. So sorry Carol. I goofed, and would like to highlight your stuff by way of penance:

Right now she has "Andrew Breitbart to Unleash the Next Big Scandal". Her graphic suggests it could reach all the way up to GE. I'll admit I don't see how that's possible, but who'd've thunk two young folks with a combined age of 45 could have triggered de-funding from both houses of Congress and a firing by the sensible Census Bureau?

As mentioned Friday, my son's team won their first game of the intramural flag football season, 19-6.

That's son Bob in the red bandana. The game was a 6-6 tie at halftime, and the Brick Squad suffered from repeated errors of execution -- stupid penalties, dropped passes and missed tackles. Nevertheless, cheered on by a particularly fanatical father ("Somebody forgot to take his medication." "Hey, I heard that, ref!"), the team rallied in the second half, triumphing over their outclassed opponents, the So Icy Boys.

"Follow the link to Media Matters and you’ll search in vain for any mention of the name of the man who pulled the trigger on November 22, which leads me to believe either (a) Eric Boehlert is a Kennedy assassination conspiracy theorist or (b) Eric Boehlert is in the habit of hiding inconvenient facts from his audience, which, if true, makes him a perfectly mainstream Media Matters employee."-- Allahpundit, Hot Air

Friday, September 18, 2009

In *nix operating systems, there is a filesystem check command, fsck, which is used to examine the integrity of a block device (hard disk) somewhere. This is a low-level command, qualitatively like picking over something with a fine-tooth comb and a magnet.

This week's FMJRA celebrates the fact that ACORN is finally getting a much-needed fsck-ing. Charles Johnson is encouraged to offer himself similar reflection.

Note: today is Talk Like a Pirate Day, and everyone should enjoy it. As a member of an organization dedicated to ventilating pirates since 12 June, 1775, I just don't have much personal enthusiasm for sounding like the enemy. But I enjoy a good-spirited chuckle with those taking a less curmudgeonly stance on the matter.

Another Caustic, Obnoxious, Reprehensible 'Nym (ACORN):O'Keefe and Giles are awesome and completely own the shiny new political reality TV show genre. Never has so much ass been handed to so many by so few.

Pandagon is unimpressed: "Until absolutely proven otherwise, I say that every ACORN employee including the ones in the 'most damning' video were, at worst, trying not to upset the crazy people." Three points, Mr. P:

ACORN is losing in the court of public opinion,

the speed with which ACORN itself submits to a full hearing by outside sources will be a telling data point,

the crushing votes to de-fund in both chambers of Congress is at least a symbolic rebuke.

Never a Boring Day on the Blog When You've Got a Big Johnson:The contrast between the Porch Manqué and the Boss Man is never more apparent than when matters of professional reputation are at stake. I have none. You can call me everything but late for supper, and it really machtnichtszumir.Stacy has both greater history available and more professional concern about reputation, as it affects his livelihood. Thus, in the present tense, scurrilous allegations receive all the affection due a rabid dog at a Louisville Slugger sale.This blog tried to capture immediate and copious support offered by Blogs That Know the Difference, but, out of sheer love for your goodness, we cheerfully re-hash that affection.

VodkaPundit: "Now, I’ve worked with Stacy in person a couple of times, at the DNC last summer and at CPAC in February. Both were crowded, high-stress situations. At no time did I see Stacy treat anyone — of any color, creed, whathaveyou — with anything less than respect and good humor."

Stogie: "Robert Stacy McCain: I Know Him Better Than Charles Johnson Does", and also: "Slander has long been a major weapon of the Left."

Riehl World View: "I remain mostly done with some of the unfortunate behavior I continue to see playing out in certain quarters out here."

A Conservative Shemale: "Personally I disagree with Johnson about 90% of the time but I doubt he is worth the energy of boycotting. He seems to be driving his readers away on his own and that's fine with me."

A Newly Conservative Lesbian: "I link the best of Stacy's recent thoughts about Charles, who really, really should not have poked the bear."

Not that Johnson appears inclined but even if he were, there are some lines you just don't cross. If you take aim at a man's reputation, as Johnson has taken aim at Stacy McCain's, you better know what you're talking about and who you're dealing with. Sadly, Johnson put fingers to keyboard without being very well informed on either point.

Troglopundit: "I don’t want to be Robert Stacy McCain when I grow up...but just once, I’d like to have the kind of real, hard-driving, bare-knuckle, knee-to-the-groin kind of a blogospherical brawl that he seems to have all the time."No, Trog, I daresay that CJ is really a DOS attack for the opposition.

Fish Fear Me: "I think I added The Other McCain about the same time I dropped little green footballs."

Avid Editor's Insights: "It seems as is everyone is realizing the fraud that CJ or LGF is." Features a screen shot of ACORN apologist CJ.

Bonzai: "I understand how it feels to be accused falsely of racism, and if R.S. McCain is from Georgia, then he probably wants to handle it the old fashion way -- a good bop upside the head -- I know I did the few times it's happened to me."

Five Feet of Fury: "If Charles Johnson is crazy, does that mean those Rathergate memos were real...?"

Pamela the Great (Atlas Shrugs): "Stacy McCain take the gloves off. Get the popcorn. McCain kicks "the sissy's" ass." Gellar even has the stomach to link a CJ response. One tough lady.

V-Dare: "It's going from "We can factcheck your a**" to "We're just making sh*t up." Also here.

The Political Cesspool viewed the CJ fracas from a very wait-and-see vantage. Ultimately, James Edwards is unsatisfied with Stacy's responses. Maybe Edwards was looking at more material, but the two TPC posts may exemplify the problem.Stacy quoted in the former "may yet be averse" seems to be viewed as "being disgusted" in the second (and I apologize in advance if I'm mis-interpreting what Edwards is writing).Mr. Edwards, I submit that you are off base here. It's one thing to desire for equal public treatment amongst people irrespective of race, color, creed, social pairings, etc.It's quite another to step into a family and tell people how to think. It might be disappointing if, within their culture, they fall short of your opinions, but, well, that's their prerogative. Appeal to the intellect. Encourage them in a positive way with facts. But hold the raaaaacism card in abeyance. The printing has been completely worn off by this administration.In summary, I think Stacy McCain's point is both clear and defensible.

The Sundries Shack: "Charles Johnson is about to find himself in an entirely new dimension of pain once Stacy’s friends jump in on this." That is one way of describing being the first blogger to get their own "Downfall" clip.

http://knappster.blogspot.com/2009/09/other-mccain-agonistes.html serves an introductory vignette and an anecdote regarding Stacy in a very even-handed treatment of the McCain/Johnson fracas. I'd like to quibble on a point in the vignette, just given the baggage related to the material chosen: making a generalization from the Wehrmacht to the Nazi party is one of those tough choices that will raise more objections than it adds value to the argument, in my opinion.

American Power: "I have known R.S. McCain for two years now, and there's nothing in him that remotely reeks of racist sentiment. Indeed, R.S. McCain represents the epitome of a gentleman and a scholar, and I testify to his unimpeachable integrity on civil rights."

Nathan Cossey: (who emailed me directly in advance, to my chagrin): "his slander and that is what this is of Stacy, Ann, Michelle and Pamela crosses my line in the sand"

No Sheeples Here: "I stand with Stacy and all the other bloggers who have come under attack from this man because I was raised to believe that a friend advises justly, assists readily, defends courageously and continues unchangeably as a friend."

A Wee Gathering of We the 'wee-weed up' People, Bitter Cling-ons, All:

Meanwhile, if there’s anyone working in the media today who would have extensive experience with teabagging, it’s Alan Colmes. Also, he’s a dirty stinking liar and I challenge him to a debate on his contention that the tea party protests oppose health care reform. You and me, 15 minutes a piece, any neutral ground. Let’s see if you have any spine, you dried up piece of offal.

Studying Studies More Interesting than the Studies ThemselvesCall me jaded, but I refuse to offer reaction to the 'Mom, God told me to get knocked up' business. I'd need to review the data and follow the funding trail to discover whether they let an excess of Coveyism lead the researchers into beginning with the end in mind, as a warm-up to reading their study.

So liberals and secularists and Yankees are evil and immoral -- but when it turns out that Christian Southerners are engaging in immoral behavior according their own criteria, well, it must be the criteria that are wrong. Pubescent pregnancy isn't bad, it's good! Outrage at pubescent pregnancy is just liberal propaganda! A goalpost-mover? Who, me?

Patriot Boy links us after a snarky fake letter on abstinence that nearly approaches funny.

Obi's Sister liked: "Michael [Moore] packs significant inertia, and it fills the screen, toppling the flat panel from the TV stand to lie there, in a pose nearly useless enough to resemble one of Moore’s films."

Now, it would be an insult to my Sensitivity Training if I did not at least emulate some sort of aesthetic awareness.Furthermore, even though I'm playing directly into the whole reverse psychology of the moment, I'm doing it in a spirit of pure irony, so as not to besmirch my knuckle-dragger bona fides.Thank you very kindly, Adrienne.

Track-a-'Crat, who puts us first after a shot of W with...a zoomie. *sigh* Remember, TaC, the chief good thing in Colorado is VodkaPundit. Go, Navy!

Trog liked my Gibson Doctrine quip, but I object to his use of a family photo of mine out of context. That was from one of my poetry recitals. Caption: Don't puke if you ate, don't look if you were at the previous, and follow instinct otherwise. Porch Manqué out.

Daily Pundit linked my quip in response to Stogie. Also, a thoughtful meditation on the response I had to Bride of Rove. Finally, a quick rejoinder on the menace of Phlegm.

Yeah, this FMRJA business is becoming monstrous. Have to spread the work over more days. Which is rather a good problem to have. Please employ Technorati as your first line of feedback to tell us you've linked. If that isn't your cup o' tea, then email Smitty for inclusion. Ponder the tip jar.

The take on the setup for Joe Wilson's two-word rebuttal speech, while apocryphal, is fairly well played. Kristen Wiig takes a cheap shot at Michelle Bachman, which is unfortunate. KW does far better as Nancy Pelosi.

God bless you, Hannah. And I hope the God-haters will remember: When old No. 27's son says, "I'm going to beat you today," he's not bragging. It is a statement of fact.

Now I must go to my son's football game. Family tradition . . .

UPDATE 5:15 p.m.: Despite some sloppy execution -- Bear Bryant would have those boys running wind sprints Monday until they were spittin' cotton -- my son's team, Brick Squad, scored a 19-6 victory over the So Icy Boys. My son Bob missed a few tackles, but redeemed himself by sacking the quarterback to end the game.

Even if it's only intramural flag football, the victorious tradition must be maintained as a matter of honor.

Former ACORN workers in the city are planning to file a civil complaint against the makers of the video, according to the website Investigative Voice.City state’s attorney Patricia Jessamy said on WBAL’s Shari Elicker Show that she could not prosecute based on restrictions for evidence obtained illegally.Maryland law requires two party consent to be recorded.

O'Keefe insists that he and Giles's work was done independently and rejects liberal suggestions that the videos were bankrolled by conservative organizations. He does, however, acknowledge receiving help and advice from a conservative columnist and Web entrepreneur.When O'Keefe had filmed the first two videos -- in the District and Baltimore -- a friend urged him to share his project with Andrew Breitbart, a conservative Internet entrepreneur who had plans to launch an anti-liberal site called BigGovernment.com. Breitbart said he was skeptical after a June phone call with O'Keefe about what he had, but when the video was rolling in his basement office in Los Angeles in late July, Breitbart said, he gasped.

Doug Giles is my friend, yet I am profoundly hurt by O'Keefe's deliberate insult -- talking to the Washington Post before talking to me? When a 25-year-old punk starts insulting veteran journalists, there could be serious consequences. Expect further updates . . .

UPDATE II (1:25 p.m. ET): For the benefit of commenter Tom Rowan of Naples, Fla., who thinks the Hannah Giles bikini photo is a "hoax," some explanation is necessary:

The Google-bomb has been deployed as a defensive weapon, to ensure that hostile left-wing online sources do not gain a traffic advantage.

The Other McCain is a commercial enteprise, the revenue of which (a) is dependent upon traffic, having passed the 2.5-million hit mark yesterday and (b) now equals or exceeds my income from freelance journalism and Internet consulting.

"I write for money." Which is my way of saying, I am a professional journalist. My ability to do perform this job -- to put bread on the table for my wife and six children -- is dependent, to a degree, on my access to sources.

When it comes to getting the job done, my methods are not always orthodox. I'm not some famous network-news hotshot who can always count on important people returning his phone calls, so I am forced to use my wits to compensate for my tremendous disadvantages. "Ethics, shmethics," as I like to say. So long as I get the story, how I get the story is my own business. To be beaten on a major story is to dishonor the memory of my late father, old No. 27: "I'm going to beat you today."

Doug Giles is a Christian minister and a gentleman whose paternal wrath no reasonable man should ever wish to incur, to wit:

Andrew Breitbart is also a friend of mine, who likewise attended the 2008 CPAC party and whom I profiled for The Washington Times in May 2007:

'News addict' gets his fixFrom Drudge to Huffington, ex-slackerBreitbart finds home on the WebBy Robert Stacy McCain, THE WASHINGTON TIMESHis computer pings with every new e-mail. His cell phone rings with calls from friends. Distractions surround Andrew Breitbart. Yet he remains focused on the latest happenings from around the world, flowing into his laptop computer via a half-dozen wire services and other news sources.A self-described "news addict," the 38-year-old Californian sips a Mountain Dew as he scans the latest headlines and talks about his journey from being a stereotypical Generation X slacker to being on the cutting edge of the 21st-century information revolution.Having already been associated with two of the biggest success stories on the Web -- DrudgeReport.com and HuffingtonPost.com -- he is now proprietor of the Breitbart.com news site, a project begun in 2005 that now attracts more than 3 million visits per month.Not bad for someone who graduated from Tulane University in 1991 "with no sense of my future whatsoever," as Mr. Breitbart said in an interview during a visit to Washington last week. And not bad for someone diagnosed as afflicted with attention-deficit (hyperactivity) disorder, although he says ADHD might be the secret to his success."The Internet was like an awakening for me," Mr. Breitbart says, describing how, in 1992, his friend Seth Jacobson first told him about the online world. . . .

About an hour ago, I got off the phone with a friend of Hannah's who explained to me that the O'Keefe interview with The Washington Post was part of Breitbart's "media strategy."

Andrew is a man whose keen intelligence I admire, whose brilliant insights into New Media I respect. But if pissing me off is party of his strategy . . .

Expect further updates . . .

UPDATE III: The conservative Google-bomb defense is working! The Left is predictably doing its pathetic Photoshop smears, but respectful conservative sites are all the top Google results. All conservatives must link the Hannah Giles nude photo now.

This is simply a part of Cass Sunstein's "Secret Animal Rights Agenda". The next big bailout promises to be lawyers. Once Mumu has legal standing, your failure to provide tasty snacks can and will be used against you.

In the future, children will proceed from grade school to law school just to know enough, by the time they drive, to park a car without losing the vehicle in a lawsuit. You love the law, and the law loves loving you.

Thursday, September 17, 2009

John at the Purple Center falls short of happiness with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, one of seven in the Senate to vote against de-funding ACORN:

It's time for New York voters -- especially Democrats like me -- to send Gillibrand a clear message: we don't want any more of the taxpayers' money to be wasted on ACORN, an outfit which has few accomplishments other than scandals in its history and which exists mainly to perpetuate itself and give cushy jobs to people who are then drafted into "political action" to keep the money flowing.

But backing ACORN puts her in bed with an especially scummy outfit and aligns her with the the most left-wing elements of the Democratic Party -- and may help help put her out on her ear in January 2011. Maybe she thinks it will help her head off a Democratic primary next year, but the pols most likely to challenge her voted against funding ACORN! In any case, her vote on this issue (one of only seven!), far from fading from public view, will stand out as a major issue for her GOP opponent to hammer her with (this Marist poll shows her already running behind former Governor George Pakaki [sic]).

I've got a feeling that Senator Gillibrand's motives may resemble those of Senator Roland Burris: somebody acknowledging who put them in their current position.

I, for one, rejoice that the 17th Amendment so clearly saved the Republic from the evils of Senators with slits up the back of their suits, so that their handlers could readily manipulate them.

San Joaquin Valley farmers are getting arid under the collar over the delta smelt. Given a boost to survey a crowd of angry farmers (Victor Davis Hanson has yet do deny his presence at the event) by a staff member, the Pelosi Cat hissed at the crowd:

The right-wing crusade against ACORN is a far bigger fraud than any misdeeds a few employees might have committed

Any? A few? Doesn't the sight of the one bit of vermin make you at least mildly curious about what's lurking out of sight, Mr. Conason?

People on the left, perhaps not Conason himself, are calling for Bush administration heads on a silver platter over some water boarding. Doesn't the non-zero possibility, based upon the video evidence, of some underage girls living in horror at least budge the concern meter? One can hypothesize an existence so horrid that captive girls would cheerfully endure a session of water boarding in exchange for liberation.

Yet ACORN's troubles should be considered in the context of a history of honorable service to the dispossessed and impoverished.

What I really want, since Mr. Conason is apparently my ethical superior, and has a higher-order grasp of justice than my cheap, pedestrian morality, is some kind of function that shows exactly how one calculates the acceptable ratio of depravity vs. "honorable service to the dispossessed and impoverished".

I'll leave un-played the standard "if conservatives did it..." card.

The overall WTF that needs to be addressed is the chain-of-command issue. Why, pray tell, does money have to be extracted from the taxpayer, or borrowed from the future, and then depart the Treasury to ACORN, which seems tantamount to a Federal agency? Why should money leave DC and ever be directed at individual private citizens in the ACORN fashion?

Mr. Conason is naïvel, and his mental gymnastics constitute sad entertainment for all.

What's particularly painful about Jim Moran is that he's got not only a couple of decades in office worth of war chest, but VA-8 has more people who stand to benefit from growing the size of government than Andrew Breitbart has inconvenient clips hosted across his websites. And Breitbart is packing, indeed.

Now, if there was a way O'Keefe and Giles to do some footage of setting up an 8A company, if she's, say 1/8th Cherokee and he's got a perpetual motion machine and they are fronted by some rogue PMA elements. A little bit of DOD work over here, a little bit of remembering who your friends are over there...

Oh, that would never work. Lobbyists, like ACORN, never fall for such cunning stunts.

Hit the tip jar, you ungrateful bastards!

Understand Liberalism

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